The Singles Collection

Brings back great memories of the time and a realisation that the band were so much better than the two hits I remembered

This is a step back to carefree days of a spotty faced youth plucking up courage to ask girls to dance to some of the songs. I had heard 'Pride comes before a fall' on an oldies show as a quiz question (which hit was this the B side of)and was knocked out. It was worth buying the CD for this alone, but the other big hits were there too. Aah! the spots have gone, replaced by cares of the world, but this CD was a welcome escape.

memories galore for me as a spotty kid listening to the radio and hearing this band and others stomping out of the speaker....

Takes me back to the 70s

Great cd

Definitive collection-Son Of My Father still sounds amazing and Cigarettes,Women And Wine should have been a monster hit as well.

Great cd

A strange one, this. These tracks span just four years in the early 1970s, but chart bewildering extremes of style. The half-baked sleevenotes offer no clue as to what musical direction, if any, Chicory Tip were pursuing. The first few tracks offer catchy pop of the kind The Fortunes and the early Marmalade did so well, though the lush harmonies are sometimes suspect.Tracks 5-8 then complicate matters. 'Excuse Me Baby' is a twee litle number on ukelele, but is followed by an imprssive rocker, 'The Devil Rides Tonight', complete with fuzzed-up guitar. Then it's back to the ukelele and kazoo on the dreadful 'I Love Onions'. And yet, this is followed by the brilliant 'Don't Hang Jack' which sounds as if it could pass muster on a late 1960s psych/freakbeat compilation. The same can be said of 'Big Wheels Rolling', which features a swooning guitar solo.In the midst of all these rock tunes (there are others), are the three hits that were written for them. The later tracks seem to move back toward pop and good time boogie. It's only when you seek out the writing credits that you work out what was going on. The band wrote all the rock material which suggests that they could have had a lot more street cred had they not gone along with, presumably, the A&R men. It certainly suits them, although 'Memory', musically beautiful in a Moody Blues way, is spoiled slightly by awkward lyrics. Having said that, a lot of the pop stuff is very entertaining, if not always suitable. The sound quality isn't too clever on a couple of the early tracks, but this is an enjoyable compilation.